The Ars Technicast Episode 2—Internet: Huh, yeah, what is it good for?

We're excited to announce the official launch of the Ars Technica podcast.

We recently launched our official podcast, we're excited to bring you episode 2 this week. For those of you who missed the first episode, you can find it on our Ars Technicast page. During each episode, a group of Ars editors delve into topics we have covered at Ars Technica. We publish a new episode every two weeks. You can also find us in the iTunes store or via RSS. In this week's episode, we take a retrospective look at the Internet and discuss the impact it has made on each of us. We started this as a response to Paul Miller's current experiment to disconnect himself from the Internet for one year while continuing his work as a journalist. Our host, Senior Apple Editor Jacqui Cheng, is joined by Open Source Editor Ryan Paul, Microsoft Editor Peter Bright, Contributing Writer Casey Johnston, and Social Editor Cesar Torres. We will talk about our various entry points into the Internet and Internet culture, as well as ways in which we are dependent on it today for certain social interactions. What parts of the Internet can we live without? And how has our individual relationship with the Internet changed over the years? Listen to find out.

Join our team of Ars editors in this discussion, and keep your ears open for the occasional cameo from Jacqui’s cats.

Promoted Comments

I liked the back-and-forth between the members of the staff who see the internet almost exclusively as a social tool and those who see it as the vast repository of knowledge and entertainment. I'm kind of in the middle, and I couldn't use the internet without both aspects. Some of my very best friends are people I met online over the years and most of them I haven't seen face-to-face. But they're absolutely critical to keeping me grounded and functioning. Without them I'd probably be the bearded hermit guy who hoards jelly jars, takes in wild possums, and only talks to people once a week, in inappropriate places like the check-out aisle. On the other hand, I absolutely depend on the internet's storehouse of information and content to browse, consume, and educate myself with. It really has almost made my library, TV, and radio dispensable (though not quite). I love having access to just about everything ever recorded and gorging on information that people have uploaded to the great electronic Alexandria. Another aspect of the internet, one I think is easy to overlook if you only come at this from the social vs. information angles, is where they meet: the massive enabling of creativity and art-focused communities. There are places on the 'net that inherently balance the social and the informational/entertaining scales to whatever degree you want. This is what drew me into the intarwebz to start with.

While wondering around aimlessly circa 1999-2000 I stumbled across someone's online art gallery. They were making art that was Relevant To My Interests, and they were part of a "web ring" full of other people making art Relevant To My Interests! I started hanging around their sites every day, getting into LiveJournal just to chat with them, reading the tutorials they'd post or checking out those newfangled "webcomics" they'd recommend. I met one of my oldest online friends this way. That was basically how I used the internet for the first couple of years. Back in meatspace, one of my meat-friends at college showed me a few printouts of a certain webomic. I blew through the archives and recommended it to some of my other online friends, and a couple of us joined the comic's forum. I've been a regular there for about a decade now and consider it my primary online community. It also introduced me to other arts-focused fora and people that have formed the core of my online friendships. I've since become a member of Gaia Online, deviantArt, and other hangouts that focus not just on socializing, not just on consuming content, but doing both while encouraging creative expression and active participation in generating new works. The people that frequent these places also tend to be artistic types and we often play off each other in a kind of synergistic fashion. I've seen the same thing happen in other creative communities that I'm not party to, and I'd have to say they all maintain a strong balance between being people-oriented and being information-oriented.

Without the community aspect you wouldn't be making the content, and making the content is what draws the community together. Whether it's music, writing, graphic arts, knitting, or whatever, there are nooks within the internet where the socializing and the information-storehouse sides of "Internet" merge seamlessly. It's perfect for someone like me, who couldn't live well without each half of what the Ars staff loved most about the internet. For me there really isn't much of a divide between "keeping in touch with people" and "this is my library/museum/theater/college."

This is mostly about how my relation with the Internet has changed over the years.

As someone who grew up with the Internet starting in 2002, the Internet has mainly been a source of entertainment. When I first got online with dial-up, most of my Internet consumption consisted of Shockwave games on CartoonNetwork and Neopets, and I would spend an hour or two everyday playing on those sites. We got broadband, I found out about Runescape so I played that religiously for 3 years as an arbitrage trader. Runescape stands out to me as the first online community that I was heavily invested in and committed to, despite being a relatively boring game. This is also when I started watching my TV shows online through services like Nickelodeon Live (if I remember correctly). Up until 2006 that's all the Internet had to offer to me besides things like email which I used very occasionally.

Late in middle school I got my own computer so I became more interested in knowing my computer better and I start reading some tech sites like Lifehacker and Ars. At this point I was more curious about getting the most of out of my Windows computer and whatnot so I used it to learn more about customizing it through other software. Eventually I find out about torrents to get more TV shows, movies and music and I also find out about Linux so I mess around with that too and eventually dual-boot. I also start using the Internet to socialize with friends through Gmail/Google Talk and MySpace. Later in high school, I still mainly use the Internet for reading about computers and software but now more of my time is spent chatting with friends. However, when school got harder with AP classes I started using the Internet to find extra materials (like Khan Academy, PatrickJMT, Paul's Notes etc.) for studying as well as Google Docs to collaborate with other class mates to make review material. It goes without saying that Wikipedia and other informational sites were invaluable for researching topics. Thinking about it, it's also pretty incredible that all the interaction that went on between myself and universities occurred almost entirely online, first during the application process and now while I'm sorting out enrollment and finding a roommate. That's not to say I never picked up the phone to contact specific people for information of course.

I'm graduating from high school in a little more than a week now. The Internet still fulfills very much the same role, I look to Hulu/Amazon Prime and torrents to watch shows and use certain subreddits on Reddit for entertainment/information and as well as an online community. I receive something like 70% of things I buy for myself from Amazon through my Prime membership, and now that I have a Kindle, most of library has been migrated onto a hard drive. I'm going to a different university than all of my friends so Faceboook and Gmail will be used even more. Over the summer I'll be using the Internet again to brush up on certain courses using the sources I mentioned before. Overall all I can really say is that life would be entirely different and worse off without the Internet.

This is mostly about how my relation with the Internet has changed over the years. .

Hey trbs, thanks for your comment. I found some of the stories we editors shared in the podcast about how the Internet entered our lives to be really interesting, too. Let me know if there's future topics you'd like us to talk about on the Ars Technicast.

This is mostly about how my relation with the Internet has changed over the years. .

Hey trbs, thanks for your comment. I found some of the stories we editors shared in the podcast about how the Internet entered our lives to be really interesting, too. Let me know if there's future topics you'd like us to talk about on the Ars Technicast.

Absolutely, I really enjoyed the Technicast. One topic that immediately comes to mind has to do with technology and education. It seems that every other school district in the nation believes that handing out iPads, laptops and Smartboards to teachers and students without properly training faculty will improve the quality of education. However, in my experience as a student that has attended a public prep academy (which gives a laptop to every student) since it was established five years ago, I've found it to be almost entirely counterproductive.

While I'm tempted to share my own internet history I think the meta-analysis is also interesting.

Internet is integrated into all areas of life these days. Cooking, Eating, Music, Community, Communication, Work, Research, News, Play, Entertainment, Games, etc. People even use the internet in the bathroom on their phone.

Because of this, the idea of taking internet out of you life resonates with almost everyone.It may affect different people in different ways or to different degrees, and how it would affect different people is interesting enough to be a doctoral study, but the key here is the breadth of people it affects.

It might be just as interesting to study what kind of person would be least affects by removing internet from their life.

Another interesting topic is how the internet has reshaped society. How is internet affecting education? politics? religion?

Without internet... I couldn't do my job. I couldn't practice my hobbies. I wouldn't have easy access to reviews. My productivity and decision making process would be severely hindered. My community and fellowship practices would fall apart. My life would fall apart. I would have to start over.

Excellent question. My world is almost 90% internet, now. Ever since I left my Apple Retail job in early 2011, I've been freelancing online at full steam, and enjoying the ride. I'm so excited at this new shift in the design industry and happy to be alive to see it in my lifetime.

A good discussion on the podcast but I feel most of the speakers especially peter missed the point of paul's internet hiatus. I don't know how many of the editors saw the vergecast where he explained why he was doing what he was doing. But I actually sympathise with a great deal of his sentiments. As I feel that as the internet has got more integrated into our lives the more and more information we are bombarded with on a daily basis. From a number of routes either via the feeds, twitter /facebook. Especially if you have a job like I have which is busy in the non-internet world. The internet while invaluable as a research and collaboration tool ( especially in my field of academic research). Is a massive time sink, and is an excellent procrastination tool. As filtering all that information we get surrounded with takes up time and means that I don't have time doing other things such as reading as many books or doing more outdoor activities/meeting people face to face. As one Paul Millers thoughts were that there was a list of things he wanted to do, but didn't do due the amount of time he spent on the internet. I agree that his approach is not one I would have done because it would impractical.But I do wish at times that If I could access the information I needed without a connection to the internet, I would be more productive. As a connection to internet can be very distracting. Therefore I do sympathize with some of his sentiments. As one of the worst things for me is somebody interrupting a face to face meeting looking at twitter/facebook/email. This has only got worse the more the internet has integrated into our lives. I suppose the solution as is applicable more widely is everything in moderation. So while I wouldn't have disconnected from the internet as paul has done I would have severely reduced my usage to see what parts of life were improved/ degraded.. Also for me the internet is not absolutely essential for my everyday work, it would just make it a great deal more difficult and inconvenient,

I'm currently trying to listen to the podcast and I'm honestly pretty bored with everybody's personal internet history. I would have been more interested in what people considered essential (or non-essential) about the internet. I don't mind personal experiences, especially in text where I can skim ahead. Currently Peter is talking about using Twitter, but really that's just another "Tube" - what matters is what sort of communication he uses Twitter for. Is it for instant news, sharing cool stuff with friends, or playing the attention slut?

For me, the internet is essential for work. It's essential for paying bills and handling other financial transactions. And it's not strictly essential for information, but the information makes life much better and fuller for the amount of information I can access. I can find out about products (and even their existence), I can find about news, I can found about science, history, services, game walkthroughs. The internet makes coordination of a group easier, though not always easy.

I've already learned about the dangers of instant messaging with ICQ distracting me from focusing on other things. I've learned about the dangers of checking my email regularly. I know the dangers of social networks or time-wasters, like MMOs. I wouldn't want to lose all social aspects of the internet, but I would truly hate to lose the instant lookup aspect, as the old reference books sit unaccessed on my shelves.

I would not want to live without the functional aspects of the internet. I could live without the distraction portion of the internet (and Ars straddles the two as I use it). It's similar to the people cutting the cord, only there's far more time-wasting entertainment on TV than actual useful knowledge.

(Finally getting to a little meat in the podcast, but the conversation keeps getting scattered around topics.)

I liked the back-and-forth between the members of the staff who see the internet almost exclusively as a social tool and those who see it as the vast repository of knowledge and entertainment. I'm kind of in the middle, and I couldn't use the internet without both aspects. Some of my very best friends are people I met online over the years and most of them I haven't seen face-to-face. But they're absolutely critical to keeping me grounded and functioning. Without them I'd probably be the bearded hermit guy who hoards jelly jars, takes in wild possums, and only talks to people once a week, in inappropriate places like the check-out aisle. On the other hand, I absolutely depend on the internet's storehouse of information and content to browse, consume, and educate myself with. It really has almost made my library, TV, and radio dispensable (though not quite). I love having access to just about everything ever recorded and gorging on information that people have uploaded to the great electronic Alexandria. Another aspect of the internet, one I think is easy to overlook if you only come at this from the social vs. information angles, is where they meet: the massive enabling of creativity and art-focused communities. There are places on the 'net that inherently balance the social and the informational/entertaining scales to whatever degree you want. This is what drew me into the intarwebz to start with.

While wondering around aimlessly circa 1999-2000 I stumbled across someone's online art gallery. They were making art that was Relevant To My Interests, and they were part of a "web ring" full of other people making art Relevant To My Interests! I started hanging around their sites every day, getting into LiveJournal just to chat with them, reading the tutorials they'd post or checking out those newfangled "webcomics" they'd recommend. I met one of my oldest online friends this way. That was basically how I used the internet for the first couple of years. Back in meatspace, one of my meat-friends at college showed me a few printouts of a certain webomic. I blew through the archives and recommended it to some of my other online friends, and a couple of us joined the comic's forum. I've been a regular there for about a decade now and consider it my primary online community. It also introduced me to other arts-focused fora and people that have formed the core of my online friendships. I've since become a member of Gaia Online, deviantArt, and other hangouts that focus not just on socializing, not just on consuming content, but doing both while encouraging creative expression and active participation in generating new works. The people that frequent these places also tend to be artistic types and we often play off each other in a kind of synergistic fashion. I've seen the same thing happen in other creative communities that I'm not party to, and I'd have to say they all maintain a strong balance between being people-oriented and being information-oriented.

Without the community aspect you wouldn't be making the content, and making the content is what draws the community together. Whether it's music, writing, graphic arts, knitting, or whatever, there are nooks within the internet where the socializing and the information-storehouse sides of "Internet" merge seamlessly. It's perfect for someone like me, who couldn't live well without each half of what the Ars staff loved most about the internet. For me there really isn't much of a divide between "keeping in touch with people" and "this is my library/museum/theater/college."

I'd like to see an article on podcast growth the last few years. I have really started listening to a lot more the last 2 years but when I ask other people at work and social events, they do not seem to be using podcasts at all. I tell them about the various podcast networks and series such as The History of Rome, and they all say,"I've never thought about using podcasts in my car or excercising". Is the podcast world really growing that much these days? Back to the subject, nice podcast Ars. Like macboer said above, it sure is nice using internet maps and trail journals to plan a backpacking or camping trips. I wish every state had a catalog of trails like South Carolina has- with maps,descriptions, and usage- http://www.sctrails.net/trails/. It has made me visit South Carolina more than I would have the past few years. Would email be the number one spur to growth of the internet in the late 90's, early 2000's? Then the rise of Ebay probably spurred the growth of internet commerce.

I love podcasts, but this seems like a very dull topic "talk about how we got on the internet" and "how do we use the internet" - seriously? That sort of thing was probably fun for you to talk about, and is fun for people who can participate. As a listener I can't participate.

This will not be going on my podcast subscription list. Hopefully you'll figure out a topic next time which is more instructive and/or illuminating for a non-interactive listener.

I love podcasts, but this seems like a very dull topic "talk about how we got on the internet" and "how do we use the internet" - seriously? That sort of thing was probably fun for you to talk about, and is fun for people who can participate. As a listener I can't participate.

This will not be going on my podcast subscription list. Hopefully you'll figure out a topic next time which is more instructive and/or illuminating for a non-interactive listener.

Ditto. do you have some sort of agenda for what topics you plan on discussing next?

Generally, in broadcast you want the host to sound his or her best... you should think about getting the host a better mic, a faster connection, or change her audio settings - whatever makes the host not sound like she is talking though a $5 microphone (which sounds too close to her mouth).

Perhaps think about recording it at the source, full bandwidth, from her point-of-view using inexpensive semi-pro/prosumer equipment (condenser mic, pop screen, and perhaps a compressor). Then transcoding the audio for the feed (or later podcast, if its not live). A decent setup would cost under $300.

It's painful on the ears, and comes across very amateurish to listen, as is.

Cesar Torres / Cesar is the Social Editor at Ars Technica. His areas of expertise are in online communities, human-computer interaction, usability, and e-reader technology. Cesar lives in New York City.